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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27236638">What's My Age Again?</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldStarGrl/pseuds/GoldStarGrl'>GoldStarGrl</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Cobra Kai (Web Series)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>1990s, Angst, He's an adult in this one calm down, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Oral Sex, Praise Kink</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 09:01:29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,560</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27236638</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldStarGrl/pseuds/GoldStarGrl</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"Nobody likes you when you're twenty-three..."</p><p>1990. Johnny is drunk and has a point to prove when he runs into Kreese at a bar.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>John Kreese/Johnny Lawrence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>83</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>What's My Age Again?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>
  <b>
    <span class="big">1990</span>
  </b>
</p><p>One day, when he’s much older, Johnny will realize that if he adds all the stops and starts together, Shannon is the longest relationship of his life.</p><p>It’s a cycle, from the time they meet in a bar that doesn’t card, trying to pretend they're not lonely with most of their friends off at college. They’ll stay together for a month or two, getting high and fucking on the couch in her basement apartment. Then they’ll fight about something stupid – Johnny stands her up for a movie, Shan meets some guy at a Phish concert and disappears to Baja for two weeks – and break up until someone’s bored and horny and calls from a payphone outside a bar. It takes ten years of hangovers and getting shoved into the back of cop cars and Robby screaming in his Salvation Army crib for them to finally break apart for good.</p><p>But. Right now, he’s only twenty-three. That’s a long way off. It’s <em> all </em> still a long way off. For now it’s just a fight. </p><p>Johnny’s back hurts from a ten-hour day laying concrete for Mr. Brown’s company, and he had to drive all the way to fucking Pasadena to do it. He needs new work boots he can’t afford, but if he mentions needing money to his mom she’ll tell Sid and he’ll make fun of him for the next six months for being a screw-up. </p><p>When he tried to pull Shan into his lap, fuck this exhausting day out of his mind, she smacked his chin and told him to fuck off, she was "too hungover to pretend to like your needledick”. </p><p>He calls her a bitch and she smacks him again, and he’s down the stairs before he does something stupid like drive his fist through the wall or break her shitty IKEA furniture. </p><p>The bar down the street is doing trivia night, which – shockingly – makes Johnny want to hit something, but he has an open tab there, and a quick pat-down of his jeans tells him he left his wallet at Shan’s when he stormed out. So he reluctantly heads over, toes of his crappy shoes dragging in the dirt.</p><p>Some bar back is holding court near the entrance, asking what year Hawaii was annexed into a microphone that echoes off the walls. Johnny winces, fights the urge to close his eyes. The only thing worse then being here is crashing into some whiny college kid because he was trying to pretend he wasn’t.</p><p>He gets a beer and goes as far into the back of the bar as he can, where it’s darker and quieter. He downs it so fast he almost chokes, and waves down a waitress for a second. </p><p>“Question ten,” the bar back shouts brightly to the room. “The 1975 animated film <em> Ricki Ticki Tavi </em>is popular in India and the United States for the story of a mongoose fighting against evil forces in a family’s garden. What type of animal are his foes, Nag and Nagaina?”</p><p>“C’mon, kid,” a raspy voice says, too close to his ear. “You should know this one.”</p><p>Johnny jumps, slides to the right and throws out an arm to keep whoever this invader is at a distance. But a rough hand grabs his wrist, twists until a hiss of pain escapes, and then drops his arm to the table with a dead <em> thud</em>.</p><p>Kreese. In a dark green jacket with the collar flipped up, a scotch with no ice in his grip. He looks the same as he did five, almost six years ago. Like, exactly the same. Like he’s been sitting in the shadows this whole time, just waiting. </p><p>“You can’t be that rusty already,” he said.</p><p>“What are you doing here?” Johnny snaps. </p><p>“I think I’ve earned the right to drink wherever I want to in this country.”</p><p>“I thought you were dead.”</p><p>Kreese arches an eyebrow, and Johnny hates his face for getting hot. Bobby had told him once, when he went to visit him up in college and the conversation drifted to their dramatic senior year, that “<em>Sensei's gotta be long gone by now</em>,” and his stupid, boozy brain took <em> gone </em> to mean <em> six feet under. </em></p><p>As soon as he can find a pay phone, Bobby’s gonna get a call about using exact fucking language.</p><p>The waitress delivers Johnny’s second beer. He wraps his fingers around the base until they go numb with the cold, forces himself to take a sip. He can feel Kreese watching the muscles in his neck move as he swallows.</p><p>“Johnny?” He says, and he realizes that Kreese never actually called him that, growing up. It was <em> Mr. Lawrence </em> and <em> kid</em>.</p><p><em> Loser, </em> a few times there at the end. </p><p>It’s enough to make him turn, look Kreese in the eyes. He’s not totally sure, sitting down, but he thinks they’re the same height now. Johnny might even be a little bit taller.</p><p>He slams his beer on the table and bares his teeth. “What do you want, man?”</p><p>“Don’t hurt yourself. I just saw my best student across the room, thought I'd say hello. Seemed like kismet.”</p><p>Johnny doesn’t know what that means, but he nods anyway, takes another drink. His back is pressed straight against the wooden booth, which in turn is nailed to the wall. That usually makes him feel safe. <em> Never sit in the middle of the restaurant, too many points of attack. </em> The man who taught him that is six inches away.</p><p>Now he feels a little like he’s run out of room to run.</p><p>“Sweetheart?” Kreese catches the waitress by the arm, and her face spasms for a second in displeasure. “Can you get me and my friend here two MacCallan neats? On me.”</p><p>“I already have a drink,” Johnny mumbles as the waitress extricates herself and goes to get them. Kreese laughs, takes the bottle out of his hand to examine it.</p><p>“You have <em> beer</em>. You’re a man now, you need a man’s drink.” </p><p>He sighs. It’s better than the stuff he can afford anyway.</p><p>They don’t talk through the first drink. Johnny pretends this is a win, that this negates letting Kreese sidle up next to him, buy him drinks like some girl. He sits with his knees locked, spine straight. Watches other people get drunker and worse at guessing what team won the World Series in 1918 and how many languages they speak in Switzerland. </p><p>Kreese just watches him.</p><p>“Who needs to know this shit?” He asks, amused. “A bunch of college boys, just trying to show off.”</p><p>“Stuck-up pricks.” Johnny agrees without meaning to. He hasn’t eaten today – he was hoping to score some food from Shan’s apartment before she kicked him out – and so the scotch is making him feel loose and floaty. Too much, too soon, for someone his size.</p><p>“You do real work. I can tell.” Kreese says, nodding to Johnny’s plaster stained jeans and flannel. “Kept you strong, looking like a warrior.”</p><p>“Kept me earning minimum wage.” He rolls his eyes, trying to ignore the warm feeling that blossoms in his chest at the approving tone.</p><p>They get another round. Johnny relaxes his legs a little.</p><p>“It’s<em> Road House</em>,” he says quietly, a few sips into the new scotch. The bar back wants to know what 1989 action movie starred an actor also known for <em> Dirty Dancing</em>.</p><p>“Patrick Swayze?” Kreese asks, and Johnny nods. “Right. You were a little fruity for him.”</p><p>The gentle, buzzed warmth disappears. “<em>What?</em> No I <em> wasn’t</em>.” </p><p>Something he’s always hated about being so blonde and pale is that whenever he gets even a little flushed, his entire face looks like a tomato. </p><p>When they were fourteen, he made his friends go see <em> The Outsiders </em> so many times even Bobby put his foot down. Johnny pretended he just thought it was bad-ass, that he didn’t feel warm and out of sync with his heartbeat whenever he saw Swayze's arms in that shirt with the sleeves rolled up.</p><p>Dutch even teased him about “your boyfriend Darry” at practice, in front of everybody. Johnny beat him into the mat while Kreese looked on approvingly.</p><p>He seems amused by Johnny’s embarrassment now, blushing in the dim bar light. “Nothing we didn’t fix. Cobra Kai got you on the right track. Taught you how to be a man.”</p><p>Johnny pounds his scotch and immediately wishes he hadn’t; he can’t stop from flinching at the burning feeling in his throat. </p><p>The final weeks before his '83 and '84 tournaments, he used to have an extra half-hour of training with Kreese after his regular classes. Just the two of them in the quiet dojo as the parking lot emptied and the California sky turned pink and red. </p><p>And the thing is, nothing happened. Really. Sometimes Kreeze adjusted his stance, let his hands linger on Johnny’s stomach, his hips. Sometimes he’d get Johnny on his back and stretch him out, push his legs as far up against his chest as they could go. </p><p>Their faces had been really, close, then. Kreese's breath was hot on his neck.</p><p>And even though Nothing Happened, it all made Johnny feel weird and squirmy, like he did when he and Ali had been making out for hours and everything was overheated and sensitive. Like he did when he watched Swayze kick ass in those tight clothes. </p><p>Like he wanted something.</p><p>Kreese is still looking at him – gazing into his soul. Even though the bar has done nothing but get louder and more crowded, it suddenly seems very quiet and loaded between them.</p><p>“You taught me how to be a man, huh?” He asks. </p><p>Kreese’s hand moves on his thigh. The pads of his thick fingers are just a few inches from his crotch. His skin feels hot, even through jeans. Johnny exhales hard out his nose. Still on the edge, that line with plausible deniability. </p><p>He’s drunk and tired and pissed off. He’s broke and his girlfriend doesn’t even like him and he misses a time when none of these things were true.</p><p>He’s twenty-three. </p><p>He shifts, just a little, so Kreese’s palm is on his dick. Kreese squeezes too hard, a low chuckle coming out of the back of his throat when Johnny twitches with interest.</p><p>“Still need to learn a thing or two, I see.”</p><p>“Shut up,” he mumbles. Kreese’s other arm reaches around and grabs him by the waist, pulls him, too hard, back to his side. Like he’s his <em> bitch</em>.</p><p>“That’s not a very respectful way to speak to your Sensei,” he murmurs in his ear, and grabs at Johnny’s half-hard dick again.</p><p>Johnny elbows him hard in the face, and it’s so sudden he actually gets the drop on Kreese, knocks him out of the booth and onto the floor. His eyes narrow and he drags Johnny down with him, socking him in his stomach.</p><p>“Hey! Enough!” The waitress is waving for the manager. “Take it outside!”</p><p>They’re jostled out the back door, into the alley. The heavy metal door slams shut behind them. It rings in the night air as Johnny moves his feet, whirls in a circle, trying to get his bearings. </p><p>But Kreese doesn’t try to fight him. He just leans against the brick wall, cool as anything. When Johnny turns to him, he reaches out, grabs his belt loops, and drags him in, flush against his chest. </p><p>He's hard too.</p><p>“Still got that temper,” he mumbles. His hand snakes down, pinches Johnny’s inner thigh, then kneads the sore spot. Johnny lets out a strangled little hiss, and he clicks his tongue in disappointment. “Now, now. Gotta learn some discipline, Mr. Lawrence.”</p><p>Johnny wrests out of his grip, but doesn’t back away. He feels...awake. Alert. A cobra uncoiling. “Make me.”</p><p>Kreese undoes his own belt with one hand, laces the other hard through Johnny’s hair. He yanks. “What was that?”</p><p>Johnny bares down and just says it. “Make me, <em> Sensei</em>.”</p><p>Kreese pushes on his head, and he drops to his knees.</p><p>He hasn’t sucked cock before, not really. A few years earlier, he’d been shitfaced and out of money and did it for coke, but that didn’t count. That was business. It wasn’t...like this. </p><p>Kreese’s dick is heavy and wet against his lips, and he parts them obediently, takes him in his mouth. He’s not<em> so </em> plastered that he doesn’t choke a little. </p><p>“<em>Focus</em>,” Kreese tells him, hands tighter in his hair, pulling hard enough to hurt. “I know you can do better than that.”</p><p>So he does, hollows out his cheeks, sucks a long, slow stripe down the length of Kreese’s cock. He’s rewarded with a little thrust against the back of his throat. The pavement is cold on the knees of his jeans, and this is so <em>stupid</em>, he<em> lives</em> in this neighborhood, anyone could just walk by and <em> see</em>–</p><p>Oh man. That’s actually making him harder.</p><p>He sticks his hand down the front of his jeans, jerks himself off clumsily. His jaw is starting to ache, but he doesn’t pull his mouth off of Kreese, not even when his boxers get sticky and warm and his whole body jerks a little with an ugly, fast orgasm.  </p><p>“Keep it together,” Kreese says, and his tone isn’t warning, it’s…instructive. <em> Square your hips, keep your elbow behind your fist when you punch. </em>“Men finish the things they start. You're a man now, aren't you?"</p><p>He nods, head bobbing on his dick, and tries to breathe through his nose as he sucks him down to the root.</p><p>When Kreese comes down his throat, he does his best to swallow without flinching, even though it’s bitter and sudden, because he can <em> do </em> this, he can do better.</p><p>He’s a winner.</p><p>“Christ, kid,” Kreese pets the top of his head, and Johnny barely resists the urge to let his head drop against his leg. He’s exhausted, all the sudden. Those big fingers brush a strand of his hair off his sweaty forehead. “You’ve got all kinds of hidden talents.”</p><p>Johnny tries to stand, but Kreese grabs his chin and tilts it up, appraising him, like he used to.</p><p>“I paid you a compliment,” he says, expectant.</p><p>“Thank you,” Johnny says reflexively. His voice is a little raspy. Fuck, he couldn’t remember if any of the babes who blew him sounded like that after. Was it going to stay like that? If someone asked at work tomorrow, would he have to say <em> nah, I’m not sick, I was sucking off my old karate teacher behind a bar? </em></p><p>Kreese doesn’t seem the least bit perturbed. He holds out a hand, but Johnny doesn’t take it, just rolls back a little on his heels and pushes himself into standing. Kreese’s grin grows.</p><p>“Good boy.” He pets Johnny again, this time on the cheek, and a warm shiver runs down his spine.</p><p>Kreese pulls himself back together and strides out of the alley, his hands in his pockets. Johnny swears he hears him whistling.</p><p>He sits back down in the alley, figures the beauty of southern California is that he won’t freeze to death if he hangs out here for a while, maybe for a few days or weeks, forever.</p><p>Years later, he’ll calculate that Shannon is the longest relationship of his life. But that’s not exactly true.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>1) For the record, the villains in Ricki Ticki Tavi are cobras.<br/>2) The title is after the blink-182 <a href="https://open.spotify.com/track/4LJhJ6DQS7NwE7UKtvcM52?si=ndgVrykNSD6GEDCJhBAUjQ">song of the same name.</a> It's a bop and VERY Johnny.<br/>3) It is my firm belief that Robby's middle name is Swayze because both his mom AND dad had a secret crush on the actor. You know it's true.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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